Title: "The Lamentable Demise of George" Part 2
Author: Madeleine Mitchell Carr
Email:
Category: General, Josh/Donna
Rating: PG
Summary: Josh, Donna, a chinchilla. General mayhem and confusion. Many misunderstandings ensue. A touch of angst and a pinch of romance.
Josh POV
Spoilers: Post-'Noel'. General season 2 stuff
Disclaimer: These characters belong to Aaron Sorkin and NBC; I'm just borrowing them. Please don't sue me, as I have no money.
Feedback will be taken in, fed and loved to excess
Today has been not a good day. Frankly I've had worse days - much worse; I can think of at least 4 or 5 off the top of my head which had automatic entry into the Lyman Annals of Horror, but still…. Today has been incredibly wearing. And tiring. And weirdly upsetting. All in all, not good…
The day in question started bizarrely when I was woken up by the sound of George flinging himself against the bars of his cage. I am very new to pet ownership, but this seemed like a strange thing for a chinchilla to be doing. And he has a big cage; it's not like he'd been forced to scuttle around in a 1-foot square prison. His big brown eyes looked sort of frantic and trapped. He seemed to be silently screaming "Help me, help me". God knows what weird kick his furry little brain was on, but I don't mind admitting that it was rather unsettling - not least because I kind of knew how he felt.
When you start the day identifying with a rodent, things aren't going to get much better.
Anyway, I've been paying my neighbour's son (Robbie?, Rabbie? - something..) to let himself into my apartment when he finishes school to feed George, so I figured that I could give him a call later and see if my pet was still acting crazy. When I got to the office around 7.30 I was having an attack of the guilts. What the hell did I know about chinchillas? Perhaps I'd been doing something really wrong and he was being slowly poisoned or something, so I scrambled around the yellow pages for a few minutes trying to find the number of a vet.
Did you know that there are 27 veterinary surgeries in downtown DC? I had no idea there were so many pets requiring surgery. I mean, there is obviously some kind of pet-orientated sub-culture going on out there that I know nothing about. I mean, is it something I should know about?
The vet I picked was out on call so I left a message for him to call me back. I could have tried another, but to be honest, I'd started to feel a little embarrassed about spending valuable government time worrying about a chinchilla. God knows what my esteemed colleges would think; I actually shuddered at the thought of Sam or Toby ribbing me about this. I'd never hear the end of it.
No, I hadn't told anyone at the White House about George. What, do you think I'm crazy or something? My mental stability is in question as it is.
I had considered telling Donna, but I wasn't entirely sure what her reaction would be. She could likely go down the "Aww, that's really sweet, Josh" road, and her eyes would get all soft and mushy. That was tempting, but, hey, this was Donna. She could just as likely find it hilarious, rush off and tell everyone about it, and I'd have to put up with all the assistants sniggering at me as I passed.
Come to think of it, she would probably do both.
No. George was strictly on the QT. Need to know basis only. And as far as I was concerned - nobody needed to know.
As it happened, all thoughts of George were put out of my head for the rest of the morning as I was hard pressed trying to convince some dunderheaded Republican congressmen that supporting a bunch of fat cat sheet wearing Corporate bigwigs who wanted to reclaim part of the Everglades was a really bad idea.
Naturally I succeeded. I am so da man.
I didn't get to enjoy my success for long though. My phone rang.
"Josh"
"Yes, oh great and wise assistant?"
"You're from Connecticut Josh, not Kansas"
Then her voice took on that soft inflection that normally turns me into a stuttering marshmallow.
"Stanley's on the line"
Ah. Not in this case apparently.
"Um… Okay, put him through"
Sydney was phoning to ask if I'd decided to address an ATVA group he was hosting next week. Sydney's a good therapist - he's helped me and I owe him, but I'd balked at the idea of baring my soul to a group of gunshot victims when he asked me a few days ago, and I was still balking now. I'm not afraid of public speaking (some might say I thrive on it), but talking about surviving an almost fatal injury and getting on with your life is really quite different. I'd rather just - well, get on with my life.
I was going to say all this to Stanley (in fact I'd practised saying it to George last night), but once Stanley had done his spiel about how other survivors would be helped by my experiences and how it would help me to get support from people with similar problems, I found myself weakly agreeing.
Damn, must have worn out my persuasive powers on Republicans.
It wasn't until I'd put the phone down that I realised that I probably should have run this past Leo, maybe even CJ before agreeing. I'm sure it would be a private meeting, but security probably wouldn't be very tight, and it frankly wouldn't be good if a prominent member of the Bartlet administration was seen going to group therapy. Still - was it actually any of their business? and more importantly, was it any of the American public's business?
We do not comment on the personal lives of the White House staff
Why give CJ more material not to comment on?
TBC
Have you guessed who Dr Anderson is yet? When, oh when is George going to kick the bucket? Will I ever get to the point?
Find out in the next instalment.